The university community will take time Monday, Jan. 18, to celebrate Martin Luther King. On the Danforth Campus, the event will recognize St. Louisans who advance King’s message through service and leadership. The Brown School’s Jason Purnell, PhD (right), will give an address at 7 p.m. in Graham Chapel. On the Medical Campus, social epidemiologist Sherman James, PhD, will speak at 4 p.m.

Elaine Mardis, PhD, co-director of The McDonnell Genome Institute at the School of Medicine, joined 14 other scientists and clinicians last week at the White House to talk with Vice President Joseph Biden’s staff about his “moonshot” challenge to cure cancer. The researchers highlighted precision medicine, immunotherapy and other advances.

Herbert (Herb) Weitman, who served as director of photographic services at Washington University for more than four decades, died Tuesday, Jan. 12, 2016, at Missouri Baptist Medical Center in St. Louis. He was 89.

In a new analysis, researchers at the School of Medicine have shed light on the hereditary elements across 12 cancer types — showing a surprising inherited component to stomach cancer and providing some needed clarity on the consequences of certain types of mutations in well-known breast cancer susceptibility genes BRCA1 and BRCA2.

Undergraduate tuition at Washington University will be $48,950 for the 2016-17 academic year — a $1,650 increase over current academic tuition, announced Amy B. Kweskin, vice chancellor for finance and chief financial officer. As with last year, when the percentage increase was the university’s lowest in 47 years, the percentage increase remains at 3.5 percent.